The current drought condition in Northeast Georgia has left an emergency situation at Cornelia Reservoir, the water source for Cornelia residents. The water level at the reservoir on Monday, August 10, was only 2 feet deep. The reservoir was initially built to hold at least sixteen feet of water, assuring plenty of water for Cornelia residents even during a drought.
Marty Boyd, with Carter and Sloope Engineering, Cornelia’s engineering firm, told Now Habersham, “Cornelia’s water reservoir was built in the 1960’s and originally had three purposes, first, to provide drinking water, and secondly to handle flood water run-off. It also has to handle sediment deposits that flow into the reservoir.”
After fifty years of sediment deposits, combined with the current drought, an emergency situation exists for Cornelia’s water supply. Boyd went on to say, “The reservoir has reached and exceeded the maximum sediment deposits in the reservoir, and so the plan is to fairly quickly remove build up around the intake, and then for the long-range, to work with municipalities along Camp Creek and Hazel Creek, and in other areas, to limit the amount of run-off sediment that ends up in the Cornelia’s water reservoir.”
Because of the situation, the Cornelia City Commission has voted to allocate $200,000 for an emergency dredging of the area around the water intake valve near the earth dam of the reservoir. It’s not unusual for reservoirs to build up sand and silt deposits at the lake-side base of the dam. The work will be completed by River Sand Inc. The dredging company may provide a credit back to the city if the dredged silt deposit is usable as marketable sand.
Originally, the long-range plan was to obtain grants to build a new water treatment plant first in Cornelia, followed by dredging of the reservoir to hold more water for the new facility.
